Be cautious!

We were counting users which were active during the time 01/08/2012-31/07/2014. We used a 2 year time span to avoid effects from proposal submission deadlines; to reduce the influence of downtime for example from construction work; to also include users which come on a regular basis, but not every year. Some tests show, that a one year survey would come up with very similar numbers, so the 2 year timespan does not so much affect the total number of users but rather levels out exceptional events.

The definition of an active user slightly varies from facility to facility. In principle, we consider anyone (including facility staff) an active user who was during that time span

on a proposal submitted during that time, including rejected or currently reviewed proposals ... or

on a proposal submitted prior to 08/2012, but which entitles for beamtime during the time span ... or

on a beamtime application ... or

visiting the facility as a user

The definition of an active user does not have to be absolutely identical for each facility, in case a user management system can not exactly match the criteria. For example, some facilities might not distinguish between proposal and beamtime application. Some facilities don't record in-house users the same way as external users. So the numbers given below might well be very inaccurate in some cases, but we try of course to minimize potential errors. An entry saying, facility A has 2345 active users during the 2 year time span, just means: facility A had at least 2345 users, but might actually be much more.

Current status of the user survey:

The table shows the number of the hashes received and the number of unique entries. Duplicates have been filtered out, which results in the difference between number of users and hashes. Numbers in brackets are for the individual photon/neutron sources in cases where sites operate more than a single source.

Partner

Facilities

#of hashes

#of users

#of countries

Link

ALBA/CELLS

ALBA (Synchrotron)

1303

1303

30

DESY

PETRAIII (Synchrotron) + FLASH (FEL)

3680

3683

43

DIAMOND

DLS (Synchrotron)

10445

10445

59

ELETTRA

ELETTRA (Synchrotron)

3422

3422

60

ESRF

ESRF (Synchrotron)

10786

11009

55

MLZ

MLZ (Neutron)

1432

1430

43

ILL§

ILL (Neutron)

4151

4138

50

CEA

LLB (Neutron)

-

-

-

STFC

ISIS (Neutron)

3406

3406

49

PSI

SLS (Synchrotron) SINQ (Neutron)

39811424

39911427

4544

SOLEIL

SOLEIL (Synchrotron)

5134

5147

53

HZB*

BERII (Neutron)BESSYII (Synchrotron)BERII+BESSYII

2378384171

2378384114

53

SLAC

LCLS (FEL)

1123

1123

-

ORNL

SNS (Neutron)

3723

3723

43

TOTAL

10 Photon Sources 6 Neutron Sources

58109

43503

95

(*) Data separating neutron and photon users are currently only available for 2014! HZB numbers cover the entire period!
(§) ILL had an extended shutdown period (06/2013-06/2014) leading to an unusually low number of users for the time covered by the survey!

Basic numbers

Total number of hashes:

55070

Photons:

40712

Neutrons:

14358

Total number of unique users:

41665

Photons:

32257

Neutrons:

11976

Using only Neutrons:

9408

or 22.5% of all unique users

Using only Photons:

29689

or 71.2% of all unique users

Using Neutrons and Photons:

2568

or 6.1% of all unique users

Using more than one facility:

9091

or 21.8% of all users

Using more than one Photon source:

6343

or 19.7% of all photon users

Using more than one Neutron source:

1719

or 14.6% of all neutron users

Total number of returning users:

19030(43.7%)

Photons:

14740 (45.7%)

Neutrons:

4323 (36.1%)

Total number of new users:

24473 56.3(%)

Photons:

17517 (54.3%)

Neutrons:

7653 (63.9%)

Unique and Common Users

Currently there are only hashes available for US facilities SNS and LCLS, which make 4840 out of the more than 35.000 users. The comparison between US and EU is therefore not very representative. However, it's remarkable that from those 4840 users from US facilities, 1091 or 22.5% of the US users are also active users at European light- and/or neutron sources.

Photon Sources

Facility

# Users

Users using at least one other Photon Source

Users using at least one Neutron Source

ALBA

1303

679 (52.1%)

122 (9.3%)

BESSY II

838

418 (49.8%)

76 (9.0%)

DESY

3680

1579 (42.9%)

343 (9.3%)

DLS

10445

2598 (24.8%)

1136 (10.8%)

ELETTRA

3422

1171 (34.2%)

149 (4.3%)

ESRF

10786

4242 (39.3%)

1165 (10.8%)

LCLS

1123

329 (29.2%)

17 (1.5%)

SLS

3981

1637 (41.1%)

365 (9.1%)

SOLEIL

5134

2145 (41.7%)

349 (6.7%)

Neutron Sources

Facility

# Users

Users using at least one other Neutron Source

Users using at least one Photon Source

BER II

237

162 (68.3%)

86 (36.2%)

MLZ

1430

601 (42.0%)

353 (24.6%)

ILL

4138

1252 (30.2%)

1304 (31.5%)

ISIS

3406

891 (26.1%)

1052 (30.8%)

SINQ

1424

614 (43.1%)

501 (35.1%)

SNS

3723

581 (15.6%)

327 (8.7%)

Number of Users shared between facilities

ALBA

BERII

BESSYII

DESY

DLS

ELETTRA

ESRF

MLZ

ILL

ISIS

LCLS

SINQ

SLS

SOLEIL

SNS

neutron

photon

all

ALBA

1303

5

43

90

274

128

356

8

83

36

2

23

124

161

7

122

679

1303

BER II

5

237

27

28

20

0

42

66

104

50

0

75

22

7

37

162

86

237

BESSY II

43

27

838

128

96

95

143

16

31

16

28

29

119

100

11

76

418

838

DESY

90

28

128

3680

396

255

901

110

167

92

151

82

326

246

63

343

1579

3680

DLS

274

20

96

396

10445

297

1606

82

485

763

70

144

559

526

124

1136

2598

10445

ELETTRA

128

0

95

255

297

3422

480

21

99

41

68

14

218

379

12

149

1171

3422

ESRF

356

42

143

901

1606

480

10786

203

731

356

102

203

899

1390

155

1165

4242

10786

MLZ

8

66

16

110

82

21

203

1430

409

167

3

222

52

46

158

601

353

1430

ILL

83

104

31

167

485

99

731

409

4138

606

3

384

130

239

316

1252

1304

4138

ISIS

36

50

16

92

763

41

356

167

606

3406

9

236

101

84

267

891

1052

3406

LCLS

2

0

28

151

70

68

102

3

3

9

1123

1

79

44

6

17

329

1123

SINQ

23

75

29

82

144

14

203

222

384

236

1

1424

250

65

185

614

501

1424

SLS

124

22

119

326

559

218

899

52

130

101

79

250

3981

366

64

365

1637

3981

SOLEIL

161

7

100

246

526

379

1390

46

239

84

44

65

366

5134

40

349

2145

5134

SNS

7

37

11

63

124

12

155

158

316

267

6

185

64

40

3723

581

327

3723

neutron

122

237

76

343

1136

149

1165

1430

4138

3406

17

1424

365

349

3723

10257

2606

11976

photon

1303

86

838

3680

10445

3422

10786

353

1304

1052

1123

501

3981

5134

327

5910

25914

32257

all

1303

237

838

3680

10445

3422

10786

1430

4138

3406

1123

1424

3981

5134

3723

12570

24923

41665

Graphical view (chord chart) on common user

The image represents the total number of users per facility and common users. Only one connection is shown between each two sites. The length of the facility arc represents the number of users of the facility. The thickness of the arc between facilities relates to the number of common users.

The image represents the the percentage of common users. The length of the facility arc is identical representing 100%. The thickness of the arc between facilities relates to the ratio of common users versus total users for this facility in percent.

Where do our users come from?

Currently we count users with home institutions located in 82 different countries, including places like New Caledonia or Botswana.

There is only a small number of countries without any scientists registered at any of the neutron or photon sites.

Yet another human development index?

Comparing the Human Development Index with the location of the users of the neutron and photon sources reveals an amazingly similar pattern

Joint publications

Each facility runs a database to record publications, which are based on experiments pursued at the facility. Simply looking for identical entries in the publication databases gives a rough estimate of publications citing more than a single facility. Identity of publications is currently limited to identical DOIs. Currently we count roughly 35000 unique publications (with DOIs!) out of which about 10% are common between at least two facilities. Joint publications are obviously much more sparsely distributed than common users, only 0.9% of the publications can be found in more than 2 publication databases. One reason might be, that scientists have to register publications in each publication database separately, which might become a nuisance for productive scientists actually running experiments at several facilities. Currently, there is no other way of linking a publication to a scientific instrument used.

Lab

Facilities

common publications

APS/ANL

APS (Synchrotron)

has 7.8% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

HZB

BESSYII (Synchrotron) + BERII (Neutron)

has 18.0% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

DLS

DLS (Synchrotron)

has 20.6% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

DESY

DORISIII+PETRAIII (Synchrotron) + FLASH (FEL)

has 17.6% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

ESRF

ESRF (Synchrotron)

has 18.9% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

ILL

ILL (Neutron)

has 32.0% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

SLAC

LCLS (FEL)

has 27.7% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

ORNL

SNS (Neutron)

has 17.9% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

ELETTRA

ELETTRA (Synchrotron)

has 11.2% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

PSI

SLS (Synchrotron) + SINQ Neutron)

has 20.1% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

STFC

ISIS (Neutron)

has 26.8% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

SOLEIL

SOLEIL (Synchrotron)

has 27.7% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

MLZ

MLZ (Neutron)

has 28.2% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

ALS

ALS (Synchrotron)

has 12.2% of all its publications (dois) in common with at least one other facility

Graphical view on publications referring to more than one facility

The image represents the total number of DOIs per facility and common DOIs. Only one connection is shown between each two sites. The length of the facility arc represents the number of DOIs harvested for the facility. The thickness of the arc between facilities relates to the number of common DOIs.

The image represents the the percentage of common DOIs. The length of the facility arc is identical representing 100%. The thickness of the arc between facilities relates to the ratio of common DOIs versus total DOIs for this facility in percent.

The matrix below shows which facilities have common publications recorded.

DLS

DESY

ELETTRA

ESRF

FELIX

HZB

ILL

ISIS

MLZ

PSI

SOLEIL

ALS

APS

LCLS

NSLS

SNS

CLS

LNLS

SSLS

SACLA

DLS

o

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

+

-

-

-

DESY

+

o

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

ELETTRA

+

+

o

+

-

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

-

-

ESRF

+

+

+

o

-

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

-

FELIX

-

-

-

-

o

-

-

-

-

-

+

+

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

HZB

+

+

+

+

-

o

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

-

-

ILL

+

+

+

+

-

+

o

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

-

-

-

-

ISIS

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

-

-

-

-

MLZ

+

+

-

+

-

+

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

-

-

+

-

-

-

-

PSI

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

-

-

+

SOLEIL

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

-

+

ALS

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

APS

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

+

+

o

+

+

+

+

-

-

-

LCLS

+

+

+

+

-

+

-

-

-

+

+

+

+

o

+

-

-

-

-

+

NSLS

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

o

+

+

-

-

+

SNS

-

+

+

+

-

+

+

+

+

+

-

+

+

-

+

o

-

-

-

-

CLS

+

+

+

+

-

+

-

-

-

+

+

+

+

-

+

-

o

+

-

-

LNLS

-

+

-

+

-

-

-

-

-

-

+

+

-

-

-

-

+

o

-

-

SSLS

-

+

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

+

-

-

-

-

-

-

o

-

SACLA

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

-

+

+

+

-

+

+

-

-

-

-

o

Procedure

Most facilities run publication databases where users register publications related to experiments at the facility. The databases are either openly accessible or accessible for registered users. Where possible only journal articles have been retrieved. Since a direct matching of entries is most simple with DOIs as unique identifiers, only articles with DOIs in the respective database have been considered. Some publication databases do not record (or expose) DOIs at all. In these cases, DOIs were retrieved with CrossRefs search facilities. Due to the limitations of the procedure, no absolute numbers are being reported here (though it's easy enough to retrieve number of the databases). The collection of publications is still incomplete and will be continued.